The present invention is directed to carts or cart transport systems for use with medical ventilators. Medical ventilators typically include a large number of associated components including a Breath Delivery Unit (“BDU”), a display, a compressor, a battery back-up device, and additional peripheral components. When the ventilator components are placed on a wheeled cart to provide mobility, the components are often stacked upon one another so that components in the middle or at the bottom of the stack cannot be easily removed. For example, the display may be placed atop the BDU, which in turn may be placed atop a compressor or battery back-up device. In this alignment, replacement of a faulty compressor first requires removal of the display and BDU components, thereby increasing the amount of work (and prolonging the time) required to replace the faulty component. Such delays may prove detrimental to patient care, particularly in a busy hospital setting.
A further drawback to stacking ventilator components on top of each other on a wheeled cart is that a user often moves (i.e., pulls or pushes) the cart by grasping one of the stacked components (e.g., the display at the top of the stack). While wheeled carts often provide one or more handles, such handles are often located on the side of the cart (to provide for stacking the components between the handles), and thus a user may be tempted to pull one of the ventilator components in lieu of reaching for the supplied handle.
It is with respect to these considerations and others that the present invention has been made.